EvenMORE For You

National Nurses Month Recognition

Saluting Two Top Field Nurses

This May in every EvenMORE For You edition we are showcasing two outstanding hospice registered nurses from each site continuing with On Call Nurse Leanne Lane, RN of Crossroads in Dayton and Case Manager Kristina Wilson, RN of Crossroads in Cincinnati.

Introducing On Call Nurse Leanne Lane, RN

On Sundays, Mondays and Tuesdays, On Call Nurse Leanne Lane, RN works the overnight shift from 8 p.m. to 8:30 a.m. She has been with Crossroads in Dayton for three years and worked for a different local hospice before joining Crossroads.

She considers herself “educated and experienced” when it comes to hospice care. Leanne even left end-of-life care for a year but returned recognizing what a good fit it is for her because of “purpose.”

Leanne loves its culture and how Crossroads delivers end-of-life care noting other companies are “spread too thin.” She welcomes the independence she is granted as the only clinician on duty in Dayton charged with triage in the “middle of the night.”

Without elaborating Leanne made it clear that a lot of things happen overnight and there is never a night when something doesn’t happen. She likes to make her rounds visiting patients in facilities early in the morning before her shift ends.

On the days when Leanne isn’t working overnight as an On Call Nurse for Crossroads handling overnight emergent visits, death visits and admissions visits, she works as an emergency room nurse, often at a very face pace as a member of a large clinical team. 

Leanne admits her two types of nursing as very different from one another yet it all works for this dedicated, intuitive and hardworking Crossroads field nurse. 

Introducing Case Manager Kristina Wilson, RN

“Charting with Curantis is fantastic. It’s so easy.” That’s according to Case Manager Kristina Wilson, RN, of Crossroads in Cincinnati. She just joined Crossroads in March of this year. Curantis, the new Electronic Medical Record (EMR) platform, is one of the many Crossroads resources Kristina appreciates.

As a Case Manager, having the support of a Patient Support Services Director (SSD) overseeing chaplains, social workers and bereavement coordinators is another. 

Having worked previously in managed health and in a hospital ICU, caring for patients in end-of-life care and their families is a very different type of nursing, according to Wilson. But in a very short time she’s comfortable and excelling in her field role “in triage and total patient management.”

She is always ready to jump in to help and to make sure “needs are met.” Kristina is an excellent communicator and understands that she must build trust with families while sharing important, often difficult-to-hear information about their loved ones.

This is particularly important when visits increase and a patient is transitioning. She knows how to describe, in relatable terms, what patient decline looks like. 

When Kristina’s not on the job she enjoys her six kids and advancing her current handful of crochet projects, all in different phases of completion.

NorthStar Triage Introduced in Cleveland and Cincinnati

Inbound After-Hours Calls are Answered by Hospice Nurses

NorthStar Triage is “an after-hours and weekend hospice triage service, building on more than 40 years of experience.” Owned and operated by the nonprofit Hospice of Michigan, the company has been engaged as a third-party partner to Crossroads beginning with the Cleveland and Cincinnati sites this month.

Soon all Crossroads sites will enjoy the support of after-hours hospice-trained nurses handling inbound calls. Eventually our partnership with NorthStar Triage will replace the Crossroads Call Center which operates as a customer service center staffed with customer service agents rather than hospice triage clinicians.

Now when a family calls after hours with questions about a loved one, a registered nurse specializing in end-of-life care can provide immediate advice, dispatch a nurse for an emergency visit or transfer a call to Crossroads’ Central Referral Office, which is now staffed seven days a week. 

Meanwhile, the entire log of overnight activity is captured in Curantis, Crossroads’ Electronic Medical Records (EMR) platform.  

Planning for onboarding NorthStar Triage for additional sites is underway now. This new partnership is another example of how, as a smaller company, Crossroads can engage innovative solutions, in this case to a shortage of overnight hospice nurses, which ultimately better serve our patients and their families.

Hospice Nursing’s Hidden Challenges

Crossroads’ Danny Cox Advocates for Understanding

“What are the lesser-known challenges that are currently facing hospice nurses?” That’s a question posed by Hospice News Senior Reporter Holly Vossel to Crossroads’ Senior VP of Clinical Operations Danny Cox, RN, BSN earlier this month.

In honor of National Nurses Month in May, Holly was writing a story about hospice nursing. She requested an interview with Danny, someone she had interviewed previously.

“What we’re noticing right now is documentation and regulatory burden,” is one of Danny’s many quotes in Holly’s Article Under the Radar Challenges for Hospice Nurses posted on May 7. 

While advocating for the best possible end-of-life care for patients, Danny is also an excellent spokesperson and experienced representative of Crossroads’ holistic approach to end-of-life nursing care.